One foot in front of the other
Every day at the moment seems like a struggle just to get to the next day – an endless round of washing up, tidying up, settling arguments, and so on. It sometimes feels like life is continually chewing us up, and spitting us out. You look forward to the weekend, and then spend the entire weekend running from one thing to the next, without a chance to really slow down.
Except of course this weekend we did have a chance to slow down.
We were invited to a friend's house for a “raclette” meal. It was brand new to me – I had never even heard the word “raclette” before the invite arrived via Facebook a few weeks ago – and I have to say, I enjoyed it immensely. We all agreed that handing over cooking duties to every guest makes the evening much better for the host, because you're not always running back and forth from the kitchen. I figured out that potatoes, cheese, and spring onions made a pretty good mixture that you didn't really have to look after – and also lucked me into eating something fairly stodgy that prevented the accompanying alcohol from having too much of an effect.
The evening was wonderful fun, and before we knew it, midnight was upon us, and we needed to return home to relieve our babysitter – our eldest daughter. Last night was her first “go” at babysitting. We were only down the street, so could have returned home at a moment's notice if needed. She earned a little money for doing it, and was predictably dog tired when we arrived home – she did it though, and can see a future money making opportunity babysitting for friends children.
We were all supposed to go to watch our middle girl play rugby in the morning, but despite most of us being up, washed, and dressed by 8am, in the end only the younger children and my other half went – leaving me to look after Miss 14, and prepare for the afternoon – a last visit to watch “London Wasps” (our local premiership rugby team) at Adams Park. They are re-locating to a new stadium over a hundred miles away – which makes the chances of us ever seeing them again very remote indeed.
We arrived ten minutes before kick off, found our seats, and had a wonderful – although quiet – time watching them beat London Irish. The final try of the game saw a Wasps winger crash through the corner of the pitch right beneath us – causing ecstatic screams and whoops from the girls. A fitting end to our support for the club over the last few years – we will miss it. I have already asked the kids if they might like to visit other nearby clubs (London Irish, and Harlequins), and they refused point-blank... they will probably follow Wasps for the rest of their lives.
This evening has been quiet. We made the kids dinner, got them through the bath, and tucked them into bed, before crashing out to watch TV for an hour. I've just wired up the new monitor on the computer (it finallyarrived!), but still need to get another HDMI cable from somewhere for the Raspberry Pi. I'm starting to wonder if I'll everget it up and running.